SOLIDARITY ECONOMY FROM THE PERSPECTIVE

OF WOMEN HOMEBASED WORKERS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA:

THE ALTERNATIVE TO THE ECONOMICS OF EMPIRE?

By HOMENET SEA

SOLIDARITY ECONOMY is a quilt, a woven patchwork of many diverse economies that are centered on life-values instead of profit-values.

SOLIDARITY ECONOMICS is the process of identifying, connecting,strengthening and creatinggrassroots, life-centered alternatives to capitalist globalization, or the Economics of Empire (Ethan Miller, 2008)

Overlapping Crises as Context

The Economics of Empire, or what is generally described in activist circles as neoliberal globalization, has failed miserably in addressing the goals of people-centered development in the last few decades. Instead, there is now a convergence of crises, the global financial crisis just the latest phenomenon aggravating a long-existing poverty and employment crisis, food crisis, as well as environmental crisis in this part of the world.

Informalization and the Crisis in Employment.Due to the impact of globalization, informal work already comprised 156 million or 63.7 percent of total employment in ASEAN in 2006, according to the ILO. (ILO, 2007:3). Although the percentages vary from some 80 percent in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, more than 70 percent in the Philippines and Indonesia, more than 50 percent in Thailand, and 8.8 percent in Singapore, the average is still quite high. This rise in informal sector employment is accompanied by an alarming decrease in the ranks of formal workers. This change has led to a redefinition of the concept “worker” away from very narrow notions associated with formality, regularity, and clear employer-employee relations which now only refer to a shrinking male minority. All who live by working to earn an income are now considered workers, and therefore can form part of labor movements. They include women and men who do unprotected and unregulated work as homebased workers, vendors, small transport operators, non-corporate construction workers, waste recyclers, domestic and other service workers, and in some countries like the Philippines, even small farmers and fisherfolk.

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* Professor, Department of Women and Development Studies, College of Social Work and Community Development, University of the Philippines

It was not too long ago when four ASEAN countries – Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines – were hit by the 1997 -98 Asian financial crisis which, according to the ILO, resulted in the loss of 24 million jobs in East Asia alone.This crisis was itself a consequence of the liberalization and deregulation of financial markets culminating in the successive domino-like devaluation of Asian currencies Affected countries used different strategies in addressing the crisis, with Malaysia and Thailand faring better because they fully or partly took their own course. Indonesia and the Philippines, which followed IMF and World Bank prescriptions, did not do as well and still remain highly indebted

The current global financial crisis is expected to lead to an increase of 24-52 million people unemployed in 2009, 10 to 22 million of whom would be women. (ILO, 2009).

Informality and poverty. There are 500 million working poor in the world, and many of them are found in the informal economy. This is expected to rise to 1.4 billion or 45 percent of all total employed in 2009, with a higher proportion in the developing countries (already 58.7 percent in 2004). By working poor is meant those who are working but cannot work their way out of poverty because of very low earnings and very high risks. The figures below show that in ASEAN, at least one out of ten workers live in extreme poverty, subsisting at less than one dollar a day. (In the Philippines, one out of five; and in Laos and Cambodia, one out of three). Of the more than 262 million workers in ASEAN, 148 million or 56.5 percent - at least five out of ten -- are living in poverty, subsisting at less than the two dollars a day poverty line. In terms of country breakdown, 80 percent of workers in Cambodia and Laos, 70 percent in Indonesia, and 60 percent in the Philippines do not have enough income to get themselves out of poverty. ((ILO, 2007:4, 18).

US$1 a day working poor / US$2 a day working poor
Millions / Share in total
employment (%) / Millions / Share in total
employment (%)
1996 / 2006 / 1996 / 2006 / 1996 / 2006 / 1996 / 2006
ASEAN / 36.7 / 28.5 / 16.9 / 10.8 / 140.1 / 148.7 / 64.5 / 56.5
East Asia / 145.0 / 95.0 / 20.3 / 12.1 / 442.9 / 347.2 / 61.9 / 44.2
South Asia / 250.8 / 196.9 / 51.9 / 33.0 / 427.1 / 500.2 / 88.4 / 83.7

The ILO predicts that due to the current global crisis, 200 million workers in developing countries will be pushed to extreme poverty (living on $1.25 a day) in 2009. This, presumably, will be in addition to the 1.4 billion people (1 in 4) already classified as extremely poor in 2008. (World Bank, 2008).

Why this Crisis has a Woman’s Face.Women are particularly involved in informal employment (averaging 65 percent of all women in non-agricultural employment in Asia ) , and when agriculture is factored in, women’s share of informal employment increases tremendously, since women tend to be very much engaged in agricultural work. This perhaps helps explain why two-thirds of the working poor in Asia are women. (ILO, 2006:25-26). The informal economy is highly gendered, serving as a catch basin of women who have been among the first to be displaced from formal work, especially in the garments industry, as globalization progressed. But women have also been the mainstay of the informal economy even before the onslaughts of globalization since informal work (e.g., homebasd work) is compatible with their reproductive work (child care, domestic chores), and since their status as secondary or supplemental earners often deprive them of opportunities to find formal employment. In their particular case, class, gender, ethnicity, and other issues often intersect.

Source: Martha Chen, WIEGO (2008)

As the pyramid above suggests, women are concentrated in the lower strata of unpaid family workers and industrial homeworkers where earnings are meager and where poverty-inducing risks such as illness and job insecurity are high. On the other hand, men are concentrated in the higher rungs as employers and as fairly “regular” informal workers with bigger remuneration and lower risk.

In the current context of unbridled globalization, women informal workers exhibit strengths as well as weaknesses, and face opportunities as well as threats. Many of them have the capacity, the resilience, and the adaptability to enter many forms of employment during times of crises .because they need to seize every opportunity to earn in order to ensure family survival. However, these very same forms of employment in the informal economy are also subject to the vagaries of the global and local markets, and can be threatened by competition, instability, and lack of support. Under such circumstances, women’s overburdened state becomes a vicious cycle of having to shoulder various means of making a living while tending to domestic as well as community responsibilities. As with other informal workers, women workers have little access to education, credit, healthcare and other resources needed to meet basic needs. Informal workers generally suffer from substandard wages, poor working conditions, exposure to occupational health and safety hazards, and lack of social security.

The current global financial crisis has a woman’s face (Jayaseelan ,2009) since “it will affect women and men differently and unequally.” (Dejardin, 2009). In summary, “Women’s lower employment rates, weaker control over property and resources, concentration in informal and vulnerable forms of employment with lower earnings, and less social protection, all place women in a weaker position than men to weather crises,” says ILO Bureau for Gender Equality Director Jane Hodges, adding that “Women may cope by engaging in working longer hours or by taking multiple low-income jobs but still have to maintain unpaid care commitments.” (ILO, 2009).

Food and Environmental Crises. According to the FAO, food prices have risen by 75 percent since 2005. In just one year alone (2007), more than 40 million people became undernourished due to higher food prices. There have been rice queues and shortages in the Philippines, where one out of six families have been reported hungry in recent months. The situation has been more volatile in other countries where food riots have caused political turmoil.

The food crisis has been aggravated by unfair trade practices and the deterioration of the environment. In insular Southeast Asia, vegetable raisers find their markets contracting with the influx of cheap and often smuggled vegetable items from abroad. Poultry and hog producers are disadvantaged by imported chicken parts and pork dumped at unbelievably low prices in the local markets. The prevalence of chemical-based agriculture and animal husbandry, which is propagated by transnational suppliers of farm inputs and feeds, also does irreparable harm to the environment as well as to the health of consumers.

Climate change due to global warming is also a crucial factor in recent disasters – tsunamis in Indonesia and Thailand, frequent and stronger typhoons in the Philippines, flooding in Laos, etc.

Informal Workers Push for Fair Trade and Solidarity Economy

In the face of all these challenges, informal workers through the national homenets, Homenet Southeast Asia, and other networks, have attempted to be involved in both the macro and micro levels. They have issued position papers and joined demonstrations on trade-related issues. They have been active in various forms of fair trade advocacy in collaboration with trade unions, business groups, and civil society organizations.

Through this exposure and their own discussions, informal worker leaders in several Southeast Asian countries have evolved their own conception of fair trade – taking it to mean changes in macro-economic policies (including tariff reform, stopping smuggling and dumping of cheap foreign products) to give an even chance to local producers to have their rightful share of the domestic market; enhancing sustainability of production by making use of locally available resources, catering to basic community needs, and safeguarding the environment; ensuring workers’ rights to just remuneration, job security, social protection, and safe working conditions; and promoting gender equity through recognition of women’s work, greater equality in the division of labor, and stronger participation of women in decision-making. They have tried to put these fair trade principles to work at the micro-level by forming their own social enterprises and marketing networks.

In the Philippines, PATAMABA blends microfinance with damayan or mutual aid. It also builds women-led cooperatives and group enterprises focusing on organic food production . In Indonesia, the Setara cooperative in Jogjakarta helped earthquake survivors rise from disasterIn Thailand, savings groups with welfare funds also promote and practice occupational safety and healthIn Laos, village banks provide capital to women in povertyIn Cambodia, fair trade groups provide social marketing assistance to disadvantaged producers.

These initiatives, in order to take root in local economies, need continuous support from governments, business groups, international development agencies, civil society and community-based organizations in terms of patronage and access to capital, technology, and marketing facilities, including e-commerce.

Social enterprises and other forms of livelihood cannot be sustained without the accompanying provisions for social protection, services, and assistance in the event of sudden loss of jobs or markets, death or illness in the family, natural disasters and other catastrophic events related to a fast deteriorating environment. The working conditions in such enterprises cannot be improved without paying close attention to occupational safety and health which has emerged as a major problem area in informal work. For women workers in particular, reproductive health services as well as facilities to address domestic and other forms of gender-based violence are essential.

In relation to larger trade advocacy groups, informal workers have asked to be assured representation and participation in decision-making and implementing bodies. They have suggested that a strong gender perspective be infused in information, education, and communication materials and campaigns, considering that women’s productive labor yields the most in terms of dollar earnings (mainly through the export of domestic workers and entertainers, electronics products assembled locally, garments, home décor, and other handicraft items) and it is their unpaid reproductive labor at home which keep families alive and functioning.

In addition, they have suggested that value chain as well as gender analysis be employed in researches on various industries, in order to better understand the roles, issues, and problems of producers and workers at every level of the chain based on their gender and resource status, and to devise realistic strategies that could best serve the interests of various stakeholders in the chain. They have also asserted that the interests not only of industry survival but also those of workers in terms of ensuring just remuneration, social protection, decent working conditions, occupational health and safety, gender equity, etc., be emphasized in fair trade advocacy. They have done a lot of community work and advocacy on fair and sustainable trade, employing theater and other popular forms of education involving women workers and youth groups. They have heeded the call of “tangkilikan” and other mutual support movements in which fair trade groups are motivated and mobilized to patronize each other’s products.

In the light of ongoing efforts by social movements and civil society groups to recast international trade policies to defend the interests and promote the welfare of the most vulnerable and marginalized, organizations of homebased workers and other women workers in the informal economy also now feel the need to focus on global advocacy for better terms of trade.

It is in this context that in the WTO meetings in Hongkong, Homenet Southeast Asia supported the positions of alliances of developing countries to get better terms and concessions from the developed market economies regarding the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA), Non-Agricultural Market Access (NAMA), General Agreement on Trade and Services (GATS), and Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (TRIPS). In the face of the increasingly exclusionary and undemocratic processes under which trade deals are forged, it called for openness and transparency in negotiations within the WTO so that all stakeholders are properly informed of what is going on and can ventilate their reactions and agenda through their representatives. It declared that the interests of women and working people, especially those in the informal economy, need to be articulated, recognized, and carried forward in trade policies, programs, and mechanisms locally, nationally, regionally, and globally.

Given the context of overlapping crises in the region, Homenet Southeast Asia conducted a seven -country subregional workshop on solidarity economy in Vientiane Lao PDR, 9-11 December 2009, which aimed principally to share country experiences on village banks, social and group enterprise, cooperatives, microfinance, trade facilitation, etc. in order to learn from them.

Solidarity Economy: Whys and Wherefores

. The editorial of the latest issue of the Homenet Southeast Asia Newsmagazine (Vol. 7. No1, February 2009) entitled “Building Alternative Approaches from Locally-Rooted Ways” reads thus:

A new wave of grassroots economic organizing known today as ‘solidarity economy’ has developed into a global movement. Many initiatives around the world are seeking to reform the way the economy is organized and run.

The idea and practice of ‘solidarity economy’ emerged in Latin America in the mid-1980s and flourished in the late 90s, as a convergence of three social trends. First, the economic exclusion experienced by growing segments of society, generated by worsening debt and the ensuing structural adjustment policies forced many communities to develop and strengthen creative, autonomous and locally-rooted ways of meeting essential needs. Second, growing discontent with the prevailing market economy ushered in new ways of generating livelihoods and providing services, characterized by cooperation, autonomy from dominant powers, and participatory self-management. A third trend worked to link the two grassroots upsurges of economic solidarity to the larger socioeconomic milieu, identifying community-based economic projects as key elements of alternative social organization.(Ethan Miller, GEO Collective in

Other sources refer to earlier moorings of solidarity economy, harking back to the earth-friendly communalism of indigenous peoples still practised today, or at least to the emergence of cooperativism in most countries 200 years ago. (Allard and Matthaei,2008:5). It is true, however, that it got the strongest push in Latin America for all the reasons cited above, and its rationale is best put by one of its most prominent proponents, Marcos Arruda of Brazil:

Solidarity Economy recognizes humankind, both the individual and social being, not only as creators and producers of economic wealth but also as co-owners of material wealth, co-users of natural resources, and co-responsible for the conservation of Nature. The dominant system leads to the concentration of wealth among the few and the disenfranchisement of the many. Solidarity Economy strives towards producing and sharing enough material wealth among all in order to generate sustainable conditions for self-managed development of each and every member of societies, the peoples and the planet. (Arruda, inAllard and Matthaei, 2008:6).

Theglobal movement for solidarity economy converged with the World Social Forum movement for two reasons: 1) “They both desire to synthesize the experiences, values, and visions of progressive social movements while at the same time respecting their diversity;” and 2) “They both search for a plurality of answers to neoliberal globalization through participatory learning and reflection on our organizing and goals.” (Allard and Matthaei,2008:4). Furthermore, the World Social Forums, held in Brazil, Mumbai, and elsewhere in the South, were manifestations of “the flowering of a new form of consciousness”:

It is a consciousness which stands in solidarity with all struggles for equality, democracy, sustainability, freedom, and justice, and seeks to inject these values into every aspect of our lives, in our economic lives. It is a consciousness which is locally rooted, but globally connected, involving what the WSF Charter calls “planetary citizenship.” It is a consciousness, a set of values, which has the power to transform our economy and society from the bottom up. This new consciousness is the heart and soul of the solidarity economy. (Allard and Matthaei, 2008:4).